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Lianja

Unzip a Text File Entry into a StringBuilder Using ZipEntry.UnzipToSb

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This example demonstrates how to use the ZipEntry.UnzipToSb method to inflate a text file entry directly into a StringBuilder object.

The ZIP entry is uncompressed entirely in memory and appended to the StringBuilder without creating a temporary file on disk.

This is useful when:

  • Processing text files directly in memory
  • Avoiding temporary filesystem files
  • Reading configuration files, JSON, XML, CSV, or source code from ZIP archives
  • Automatically converting line endings while inflating the text

The srcCharset argument specifies how the uncompressed bytes should be interpreted, such as:

  • utf-8
  • utf-16
  • windows-1252

The lineEndingBehavior argument controls line-ending conversion:

  • 0 — Leave line endings unchanged
  • 1 — Convert all line endings to bare LF
  • 2 — Convert all line endings to CRLF

Suppose the ZIP archive contains:

config/settings.json

The example inflates the JSON file directly into a StringBuilder.

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llSuccess = .F.

loZip = createobject("CkZip")

// Open an existing ZIP archive.
llSuccess = loZip.OpenZip("qa_data/zips/configFiles.zip")
if (llSuccess = .F.) then
    ? loZip.LastErrorText
    release loZip
    return
endif

// Locate the JSON file entry within the ZIP archive.
loEntry = createobject("CkZipEntry")

llSuccess = loZip.EntryOf("config/settings.json",loEntry)
if (llSuccess = .F.) then
    ? "ZIP entry not found."
    loZip.CloseZip()
    release loZip
    release loEntry
    return
endif

// ------------------------------------------------------------
// Inflate the ZIP entry directly into a StringBuilder.
// 
// The uncompressed text is appended to the StringBuilder.
// 
loSb = createobject("CkStringBuilder")

// Leave line endings unchanged.
lnLineEndingBehavior = 0

// Interpret the uncompressed bytes as UTF-8 text.
lcSrcCharset = "utf-8"

llSuccess = loEntry.UnzipToSb(lnLineEndingBehavior,lcSrcCharset,loSb)
if (llSuccess = .F.) then
    ? loEntry.LastErrorText
    release loZip
    release loEntry
    release loSb
    return
endif

? "Uncompressed text:"
? ""
? loSb.GetAsString()

loZip.CloseZip()

? "Done."


release loZip
release loEntry
release loSb